I'm The One

this year we've themed it around the word available. Available. That's all God has ever wanted is for us to say here I am, send me, use me. And you have the opportunity to do that. So if you've been blessed through the ministry, it's good to receive. It's even better to give. If you want to make a donation, a one time gift or a recurring gift, just be a part of what God is doing here. We so appreciate it. You can get all the details at Elevation

Church dot org. I'm gonna sat Elevation Worship dot Com. I guess you could go there too, but the giving is at Elevation Church. What you just did, you have Elevation Worship on your sweatshirt. Hey, Elevationchurch dot org and you can select available. And we use all of these resources to continue to preach the gospel, not only in physical locations like this one, but through the amazing opportunity God has given us to impact the world through technology.

And we want to thank all of you who are apart. We couldn't do it without you. Thank you for being a part of our family. Thank you for being a part of this move of God. Go to Elevationchurch dot org dot com if you're not already there and be a part. This is going to be an amazing, amazing season, and Holly and I are believing that your best is ahead. We bring you greetings from the greater Charlotte area where

we broadcast this message. Welcome to this very special weekend worship experience at Elevation Church, where today thousands of us will not only give God our worship with our mouths and with the breadth that He put in our lungs, but there are many of us who came today to give God an offering from what He has blessed us with. And excuse us, but we're excited about it. I know it feels funny but we are excited to give back to God because of all that He's done for us.

And just look at the person next to you and tell him, I know I'm good looking, but that's not why I'm so blessed. It's because of God's grace and mercy. And that's the only way I made it through the year. That's the only way I made it through the day. That's the only way I got up out of the bed. Come on, let everything that has spread praise the Lord. Welcome Columbia, Melbourne, Florida, Uptown Greensboro, Concord, you see Greenville,

South Carolina, our EPHAM around the world. Go ahead right now. If you're watching on Facebook Live or YouTube live or the Elevation app or Elevation Church dot org or Church sermons dot com. However you found this just stumbling around looking for something on eBay and here we are by accident, Go ahead and put where you're watching from and why you're believing God for today. Because this is a series

called Available, and this is the last week. And God has made his grace, his love, his mercy, his peace, his joy available to each and every one of us. And as we make more of ourselves available to him. We receive all that he is and we're so excited. We're so excited. Here's what we're going to do. Remain standing for one moment. I'm going to read you a scripture. I'll tell you why I'm reading this scripture. At the end of this short er message, we'll worship a little more.

It'll be really beautiful. Nobody's leaving until the end. Many people are here today who flew in just to bring their offering because they connect with this ministry all around the world. And you don't even have to be in the building. There's no distance when it comes to worship, connection, prayer community. Thank God for that. So where you're watching in Minnesota, I just make up places randomly, but somebody's watching from Minnesota. It's the law of averages. I promise you,

I don't want to be in Minnesota this December. How many just thank God if you don't think of anything else that you're not in Minnesota this December. Some of y'all are sitting there. You didn't clap the whole time till just now. Well, I'll praise him for that. That is praiseworthy, Brother Steve. And when we say that, people are online all around the world. You will participate as well. This will be the weekend that many will go from consumer to a contributor where it's like, oh man, I

just watched this sermons. Love the worship. It's like, then you give God worship and it makes all of the goodness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ become flesh in your life. And we'll have time to do that. Everybody who prepared and offering, as well as even those who aren't giving. If you never give, you're welcome here. I never heard a country club say that. I never heard a restaurant say that. Starbucks will kick you out in thirty minutes just for the Wi Fi. But this will

always be a place you could come. But thousands of people we love it. We love it, We love what God is doing. This is a move of God. It's a miracle and we want to get involved. So I know many of you have your offering prepared, many of you will prepare it, you'll give it online. We'll explain all of that. Also, we're going to give everybody the opportunity to choose a word that represents what you are

believing God for in the coming year. And this is a little unique because we're setting off a new decade. We're setting off a new decade, and we'll have our Christmas message next weekend, and then a Christmas program the following weekend, and then our New Year's praise party. And I've already heard from God concerning the series that I'm going to be teaching. I came invide and I don't know who else was in there. Tim Summers i think

was in there. I told him this is what God has given me, and I'll be sharing that with you next weekend what I'm going to preach in the new year, and I'm excited about it. But today I was selecting God, what if there was one thing to say. We've talked about saying yes to God. We've talked about how I'm

trying to remember all of them now. Oh, last time I was up here, I talked about having the right why, and I shared with you how I look at a picture of my kids when I think about the church that I want them to grow up in and the God that I want them to know, and that helps me as i'm given I'm like, well, I invest in them playing baseball. None of them are going pro I

just figured that out early. But if I can get them ready to live this life with the assurance of Jesus Christ, to know their identity and him, that's something. And so we talked about that. I have a hard time often choosing between different messages. I'll usually prepare three and then pick one on Saturday. That's how I do it. It's probably the dumbest way in the world to do it,

but that's what I do. I had one on Mary because I thought, well, she made herself available and God didn't even ask her permission, just showed up, like, you're pregnant, congratulations and how She said, how will this be? Since I'm a virgin and we often get stuck on how. But God didn't tell her how. He said who, the Holy Spirit will overpower you. And I thought we could talk about the Who, which is awesome, and I'll preach

it one day. But then I moved on. I was flipping through I been feeling that one, and I said, all right, well, how about this one with the woman that had the jars and she needed God to provide for her. And she kept saying, next vessel, next vessel. You know, we're vessels of the Holy Spirit, And she kept saying, next vessel, next vessel, And when there wasn't

another vessel, the oil stopped flowing. More oil was available, but the vessels ran out, and I thought we could talk about that, are you the next vessel that God wants to fill? But then I had this one other message that was just kind of I was thinking about it and never precied this passage before, and I was praying God, I have three which one? This has never happened before. Sometimes you'll hear someone say I was reading the Bible and the scripture just jumped off the page

at me. That didn't happen, But something even crazier happened. This has never happened. I'm for since I was sixteen years old. Instead of the scripture jumping off the page, the page came out of the Bible. This Bible has been put to good use. And this is the first page that ever fell out. And look what the scripture was, Acts ten Because I'm praying which one? Which one? Look at Acts ten twenty one is said I'm the one you're looking for. I was like, okay, so this one

we're going to talk about. Look at somebody and say I'm the one. I'm the one. I'm the one. You may be seated, God bless you. I'm the one. More specifically, verse twenty one, Peter went down and said to the men, I'm the one you're looking for. Why have you come? Peter went down and said to the men, I'm the one you're looking for. Why have you come? And if funny how you can have such confidence and uncertainty at the same time, I'm the one you're looking for? Why

have you come? See? The scripture has a lot to say about the power of one. I used to hear preachers say if we had this whole church and it was just for one person to know Christ, it would have been worth it. And I do believe that. But we probably wouldn't like build this big of a building if it was just the one. We could probably meet up some a little bit more logically suited to the one on one relationship. This is a place where thousands

get touched, but God is still about the one. I can even tell us sometimes when I'm preaching, I can look around and go, God probably gave you this part of the message for them, and it's weird. Don't be freaked out about it. I promise you. I don't have some kind of spooky powers or anything. You can just tell sometimes like that's what they needed. Somebody say, I'm the one. I'm the one. And Peter, of course, Jesus had twelve disciples, eleven after Judas was kind of moved

on but transitioned, you know, was transferred. But Peter was that one. There's always the one. Peter was the one. He speak up, you know, he'd be like, you are the Christ, the son of the living God. He was the one who made the first confession of who Christ was. He was the one. He was also the one who, just a few verses later was telling Jesus, you don't need to go to the cross, that's bad for your clout.

And then Jesus said, get behind me, Satan. Same one, but depending on when you caught him, he was either wildly obstinate or obedient, and we just happened to catch him at a good time in Acts chapter twelve, because he has learned the value of obedience. Have you have you learned the value of doing what God says even when you don't fully understand it. I think that's really important.

As we give today, many of us are giving, and you start doing the math, and you're like, well, you know, I could buy this, or I could buy that or And that's probably not God telling you not to give to help people. But it's weird because you have to you have to learn how to discern. Now, now, in this particular passag I'm gonna tell you litt bit about it, Peter went down and said to the men, I'm the one you're looking for. Why have you come? I'm the one. Why have you come? Who are the men? And why

have they come? Which takes us back to what Pastor Levi Lusco was sharing last weekend. He talked about Dorcas. That baby name is available, and when he was preaching on Dorcas and he left us in Acts chapter ten, I realized this is the one. This is what I need to preach about when we bring our offerings in just a few moments, because the scripture says an X chapter ten, verse one at cesarea. Now that's not where Peter is. Peter is in Jappa because he just raised

somebody from the dead. You thought you had a good week, and Peter had been praying, but so had somebody else. And see what God is always doing. He's trying to align opportunity with obedience, and there are opportunities that God will give to someone who has learned to be obedient. Now Peter has learned obedience the hard way, but he's come to the point where he says, I'm the one. Now what are we doing? God? You fill in the blank. I'm the one where we're going? Because he knew this

was God, but he didn't know the details. I need you to write this down. Obedience is letting God set the direction even if he doesn't give you the details. Can I preach like I'm from Monk's Corner, South Carolina. Monk's Corner has like four stoplights. When I came to Charlotte, I was lost all the time. I got a tom Tom GPS for my dash. You don't know about the tom Tom. This was a prehistoric device, but now they

have Google maps and maps and ways. But it always tells me turn by turn, and then it says, beneath that details, if you want to see all of the urns, well, I never click on the details because I can't handle the details. Look at somebody and say you can't handle the details. I promise you can't. So walking with God and listening to a Holy Spirit. I've just had to learn to let him take me turn by turn. And some of us will put a location in our GPS and trust it on our dash more than we will

trust our Father in Heaven. Come on, y'all shot me down before we give in a minute. It's so important that we learn that obedience is walking in a direction that God has called you to walk, even when you don't understand the details. So there's this man right. What had happened was while Peter was praying in Joppa, there was this other man who was not a Jew, he was not a Christian. He was what is known as a God fearer. And he was also a commander of

a hundred soldiers that's called a centurion. He was posted in Cesarea, which is a place that the Jews hated. Oh they hated Cesarea. It represented Roman oppression to them, and there was a lot of racism back then. And what God is doing in Acts chapter ten, and I believe what God is doing in this day is breaking barriers. Breaking barriers. God, if you need a church to stand up and show the world what it looks like when we come together from different backgrounds, different battles, look up

and down your row. I promise you you will see somebody that does not look like you. And I'm glad about that because what God is doing in this day is killing our categories. So we can't be a black church or a white church, or a Hispanic church or a Latino church. Is it Baptist? Is it Methodist? Isn't Pentecostal? Is it non denominational? Yes to all, we are the one. We are the Church. We are the living expression of

the Body of Christ. We are the Hope, we are the light, we are the salt, we are the preservative. So at Sasarea, there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the Italian Regiment. He and his family were devout and god fary. It means that they they were attracted to the Jewish ethic and even embraced some of the practices like giving alms and praying it at nine am or actually at sunrise and

then at three pm and then at sunset. But they weren't Jews genetically, and so it gives us that background to let us know that they were devout, God fearing. He gave generously to those in need and prayed to God occasionally. He showed up for E Kids every week, and the color of the E Kids shirt didn't even look good with his skin complexion. He showed up to serve every week, even when the temperature hit under forty five.

He showed up and served every week in a chat room online, had to wake up in a different time zone. He was devout, and he was regular, and he was routine. You could say he was like the Tithers who get at this church, who just do it now one day. Yeah, he was a regular, good, good good who said that he was a regular? Touch somebody say, I'm a regular. I come to church on the good weeks and the bad weeks. I bless him when I forgot the joy, and I bless him when I need some more. I'm

a regular. Ask somebody, are you a regular? So when you show up regularly like that one day and you never know when this is going to be skinner? One day, at about three in the afternoon, he had a vision. He distinctly saw an angel of God who came to him and said Cornelius, and Cornelius stared at him in fear, and so would you. When God speaks, usually your first response is going to be fear not me. I walk by faith, perfect glove, cast out fear. Well, you never

really heard God tell you to do anything. When He shows you something to do and it's really him, it'll be so big. You will be praying a prayer of acid reflux and indigestion. I always say that I love this giving series, and I do when it's over. But when I'm doing it, I'm sitting down and I'm going, all right, God, what should we give now? Elijah. We've been given in this offering since you were a baby, and in some years God has really stretched us to

give in ways that were sacrificial. And then you come to another year and you're like, well, I did that already. It's time for somebody else to do it. You're the one this time. I was the one back in twenty eleven. But then you keep on wanting to say, Okay, God, I'm available. You can use me, you can use me, And you come to this point and you feel fear. But the Angel answered your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God.

This is sacrificial terminology like the Jewish cult system would have had it rises before the Lord, and the Angel answered your prayers and gifts to the poor has come up as a memorial offering before God. All right, now, you know how I said. God doesn't give the details, He just sets the direction. Listen how little Cornelius knew.

And this will make you feel good. If you don't know how to raise your kids, you don't know how to be a good husband, You don't know what you're going to do next in your business, your career, your life, your college, anything like that. All he said was this, Now, send men to Joppa to bring back a man named Simon who is called Peter. He is staying with Simon, the Tanner, whose house is by the sea. This is so confusing. Don't even get me started. It's a man

called imagine this conversation. Go get a man named Simon, but they call him Peter. He's staying with Simon. Simon's a Tanner. I know that Jews normally don't stay with tanner's because they touch dead things and it is considered ceremonially unclean and tanners and kept on the outskirts of town. So he's going to be out of the way. But go get him in the out of the way. Place because he's staying at the house of Simon the Tanner. Okay, see, you want me to go get Simon the Tanner. Don't

want you to go get Simon Peter. You're gonna get Simon near you get Peter. It's the same guy, but he had this thing or Jesus told him. You are Simon, but I call you Peter because you're the rock im Bill. They're on Church On. You're gonna be the one. I'm gonna use you even though you've had some shakiness. I'm gonna use you, even though you've had some trumple. I'm gonna use you, even though you got it wrong. Sometimes

somebody shout I'm the one. I'm the one, So he tells him who to go get, but he doesn't tell him why. The only way you find out why is to respond. God doesn't show you the until you respond, and then you understand in reverse why God did what he did. And then you get to help somebody out of your own pain and you realize maybe that was why.

Or you're stronger and you find out that you have character you didn't even know until the storm shook away all that shaky stuff, and now you know why I had to go through it so I could see that my foundation was on the rock. But you do not know why God does not give reasons to people who do not respond. So when the angel who had spoke to him had gone verse seven, Notice it is not what God says to you that sets the direction for your life. It is what you do with what God

says to you. After the angel who spoke to him had gone, Cornelius called two of his servants and an avout soldier who was one of his attendants, and he told them everything that had happened. I saw an angel, I promise, y'all, I know why I didn't smoke nothing. I saw an angel. I'm a good god fear and I saw an angel, and he said to go to Joppa. Now, at the time that the men got there to Joppa,

Peter was praying when opportunity meets obedience. Remember, up until this point, the Gospel has only been for the people who are within the Jewish community, But that was never God's full intention. When God called Abraham, he said, go to the land. I will show you. I'm gonna give you the direction, not the details, and I'm gonna bless you. But the reason I'm gonna bless you is so you

can be a blessing. That's why God gave you your gifts, your intellect, your capacity, so you could be a blessing. That's the real reason. That's the why. But it takes time to realize why. At first you think it's for you, and then you realize that God really just made you a vessel for what he wants to bring into the world. But Peter, look at this how God aligns things. As the men are coming to Joppa verse nine, about noon the following day, that's not even a schedule time of prayer.

His sun rise three pm and then sunset. Peter's getting in a little extra prayer. He wants to get in a little extra prayer. And he's preying on the roof so he can catch the breeze. It's a good place to pray, so he can get altitude. He goes up to Simon the Tanner's roof in Joppa, and they were on their journey, and he went up on the roof to pray, and he became hungry and wanted something to eat.

And while the meal was being prepared, he fell into a trance, and he saw heaven open and something like a large sheet being let down to earth by its four corners. It contained all kinds of four footed animals, as well as reptiles of the earth and birds of the air. Then a voice told him when he was in the position to pray was when he was set apart, when he was above just you know, the everyday affairs of life and just seeking God, like like we came

to see God today. And he was up there and he saw something and it looked crazy to him, didn't make sense to him because it had reptiles, birds, pigs. Peter's a good jew and he's not eating pork chops for lunch because he's not supposed to. But he hears the voice from heaven say something in verse thirteen. Get up, Peter, kill and eat. And then Peter's still kind of stubborn. You know, surely not, Lord, Peter replied, how are you going to tell him no and call him lord? I'm

no Lord. No to your will and to your ways. That's the remix. That's the Peter remix. No, Lord, I know better what I'm supposed to do than you do. Never eaten anything impure or unclean. The voice spoke to him, a second time. How many are grateful? God will give you a second chance? Yeah, third chance? Any fourth chance? People, fifth chance, sixth chance. Do I have a seventh chance? Go ahead and praise him if he gave you an everlasting chance. And every time you need to me speaks,

and every time you needed me, he comes. He said, do not call anything impure that God has made clean. Stop thinking you know better than God. Stop trying to live your life by reason, and receive the revelation because God's trying to show him. I'm a barrier breaker. I want to break the barriers of what you thought was possible. This is a barrier breaking weekend, so that everything that God is can get into your house and your life

and our community. The literal translation here is stop considering it common. Peter thought certain animals were clean, certain were unclean, certain people were common. The Jewish people were uncommon. God said, I want to bless the whole earth through you. I want to do something bigger then your little mind can comprehend. This happened three times verse sixteen, and immediately the sheep

was taken back to heaven. While Peter was wondering about the meaning of the vision, the men sent by Cornelius found out where Simon's house was and stopped at the gate. They called out, asking if Simon, who was known as Peter, was staying there. Simon there, Yeah, this is his house. No, not that one, the one they called Peter. Oh, yeah, he's on the roof. They don't know. He's on the

verge of hallucination. He is somewhere between losing his mind and hearing from God, and he doesn't know which one yet. While Peter verse nineteen, was still thinking about the vision, the spirit said to him, Simon, three men are looking for you, so get up, go downstairs. Do not hesitate to go with them, for I have sent them. Verse twenty one This one that came out my Bible, so I can preach it to you. Peter went down and said to the man, I'm the one you're looking for.

Why have you come? Well, he's about to find out why, because he's going to go back with these men to Cornelius's house. Cornelius has a watch party gathered in cesarea, and when Peter gets there, Cornelius has enough faith to be like, say whatever you want. Peter did not know that until he went and here's what I want you to know the gospel went to the gentiles. How many gentiles we got in the house. The gospel came to you because Peter obeyed the voice from God. But you

don't know why. Until you respond, you don't know why. And knowing that God has chosen you is difficult because you have to know that you're chosen even when you're uncertain. You have to know that you're chosen, even when you feel incompetent. You got to know that you're chosen even when you don't like how God has u said you. Never Lord, I will never eat unclean animals. It's not about the animal's dummy. It's about the gospel. It's not about the bacon. It's about the barriers that God wants

to break. Can I tell you something about the offering. It's not about the money. It's about your heart. It's about what God wants to do through you. That's why y'all come on up here. We got to do this quick. But clap your hands. These are these are five? Uh, there's five. I think I like how much I'll trust me. I'll just clap for people before you even know they

are There's there's five. I set this up earlier this week, I said, I want before we give our offering, I want five whys, uh five people or families to say, here's my why. When you find the why, the what is no problem. When you find the why, you can trust God with the how and the where and the when. When you find the why. And I held up that little picture frame a couple of weeks ago and I

shared with you a little bit about my why. But there are thousands of people, including these behind me, that represent so many of you in the room, who give like this regularly, weekly, monthly, yearly, in this offering, and I just want them to take a moment and share one minute each. It's going to be a showtime at the Apollo hook bring you off the stage if you go over a minute, hector. But this is just in one minute why I give. And I think your faith will be built as you find your why and think

about your act of worship today. I know you can't tell all of it, but just give one minute of your why. In twenty thirteen, we were living in California and came across Elevation online and we were instantly drawn to the ministry and the impact it was having on people all over. A couple of years later, we came to a crossroads in our marriage and we were both sure our marriage was over, but we both agreed if our marriage had a chance to survive, we knew we

needed to get to Charlotte. We both grew up as pKas, but that didn't make us immune to the struggles we faced in our marriage. Once we arrived in Charlotte with our four kids, we immediately felt God prompting us to not just tithe like we've done in the past, but to give above and beyond to God in this new season. If we wanted to experience something new in our lives and in our marriage, God stretched us financially and personally.

It wasn't easy. There were times our finances were down and we questioned if we would move past the difficult days, but God challenged us to keep the sacrifice high. We learned that the more obedient we were, the more we saw God blessing us. God has blessed my career finances, but above that, we have seen God's blessings by renewing our marriage, seeing seeing our kids experience God in the new and more personal way, and watching lives transformed right

in front of us every week. This past April, we celebrated twenty years of marriage. Oh you're done. I wanted you to keep going, he said. We moved to Charlotte to be a part You know, that's just amazing. People will move to a city for a job, moved to a city for a climate, but to really prioritize God in that way, and now not just people moving anyway. I gotta shut up, All right, Let's move on to

Jason and Susan elevision. Church felt so big back in two thousand and eight when we visited Providence for the first time, but we loved it. We soon found ourselves there every weekend. Initially thought it was so big that our little contributions would make a difference. Then one Sunday and December, a group of people came out on stage holding cards. One side had a word representing a struggle or pain they had gone through, the other word representing

how God had overcome that battle. When I remember, in particular, is a woman that had written infertility and then the name of her child. That one moment impacted me so much because I had miscarried the previous December and was struggling with infertility. That year. As a result of that moment, we then realized how God is changing people's lives at our church, and we wanted to give. We believe God

was just getting started and have been tithing ever since. However, the same time, we still had a private pain of infertility after our miscarriage and many failed infertility treatments. We still had faith in God, but when I turned forty three, we then started to lose hope. After trying for six years, we had finally stopped believing we'd ever have a child of our own and had started trying to accept this.

It was then at reflect that same time here in twenty eighteen, that God broke me down to start believing for our family again. Then, in December, a game changer. We both felt we should write the word miracle. On January first, for no real reason, I took a pregnancy test and was shocked it was positive. So Savannah Faith was born September fourth, twenty nineteen. We are forever grateful to God for our game changer miracle, which we call

her game changer miracle. We give to God an elevation because we know God is changing lives at our church and does perform miracles unbelievable. You got to give flow of the mic. Now, y'all know flow I give because two years ago I lost my husband due to a

heart attack, and my church was there for me. The news that my husband was gone was paralyzing, and all I could remember is just sitting in the hospital parking lot and I didn't know how to drive back home to a place where I would never see him again. It was in that moment that guy used our very own pastor Stephen his sermon about GPS to give me enough strength to put the car in drive. He said,

wherever you go, God has gone before you. And every day since I've experienced that truth, and He has done so much of it through my UC family. You see, the support I received was overwhelming. They not only showed up emotionally and spiritually, but financially as well. Probably the area where God has shown up the most has been in my son, Little Omar. The summer after my husband's passing, I sent Little to Youth X, thinking that being with his friends would help him to process the loss of

his father. But God did so much more than that, because he came home with an orange Bible after giving his life to Christ and even more than that. He made a decision to get baptized in September. So I give to my church so that we can continue to give hopes to families who are going through the same unbearable pain. Amazing, she said the Orange Bible. I don't know if you know this. We just crossed over for people who have raised their hands to give their life

to Christ, just in our physical locations. Over one hundred thousand of those Bibles that we've given out in the lifetime of the ministry. Amazing. You better keep living for Jesus Omar. I'm gonna come chop you down and taller than me, but I can binge press you, man of God. They got one person on Skype from the United Kingdom. I have no idea how to pronounce her name. I'm gonna let her do that. But I thought you needed to see. It's just beyond the walls of what God

is doing. But go ahead and introduce yourself in Share and Share. Why no, not the United Kings. Everybody my name is in a bouquet the United Kingdom. But from Ghana. Oh that's so confusing. I must tell you ya. Stretch your hand towards the sky. My name is I think I'm on, Now You're on? Okay, my name is Dubuquet. I've struggled in my life to feel like I had

a real connection to God. It was a constant searching for someone who in theory I knew was real, but couldn't feel in a lot of the spaces I was in. More So, I longed for a community to share it with. So when a friend shared a sermon link with me in college, I didn't know it would be one of the most important cliques of my life. The sermons were amazing and the worship had me in tears, but it was the online community that kept me coming back each week. To think I could be a part of elevation from

the UK was crazy, but it was actually happening. I started tithing and decided to lead an e group, and that's when it really flipped. God showed me that the thing I longed for, community, I'd actually create for myself by being that for someone else. I give because this is my family and I want people around the world to find their home just like I did. No book Now Bookayo Bouquet scale one to ten? How did I

do a terrible one? Let's get it right. New book, new bouquet, yes, k new book, new boo kay, now, okay, come on, let's give her how far he fail? We love you. I'll see you in a couple of hours when we do this again. All right, Jim and Olivia have been with me forever. What do you give? Having moved over twenty times with Jim's career since being married, we knew all along it was God's hand guiding our steps in each place He let us. We placed ourselves in the local church where we could be fed and

also serve. Although I always felt inclined in my heart towards living generously, I didn't grow up with a biblical understanding of the tithe But everything we have belongs to God already, and that we are called to get back to Him through the church. Early on in our marriage we made the decision that we would give in whatever way God enabled us, to the church that we were a part of. We've been so blessed to be a part of many churches around the world, each of which

God has used in our lives. When we retired, and I like to say, Jim says that words not in the Bible, we moved to Charlotte. We had no idea that we would end up in a church like Elevation. Elevation, though, has been our church home since twenty ten, and it's been a privilege for us to continue to give towards the work that God is doing here. We never grow tired of seeing people fall in love with Jesus and being a part of helping them grow in their faith.

So I don if you remember telling me this, Livy one time she told me, if you ever see me in my in your sermon and I look like I'm not paying attention, I'm praying for you, she says. Sometimes I just pray for you. Do you remember telling me that? She is like, just want to make sure you don't think I'm bored sleeping. I'm praying for you, that God would use you as a vessel. And yet, the crazy thing about it is it's not lectures or music that

God uses to touch lives. It is the faithfulness of thousands of people who now believe that I'm the one. I'm the one God. If you want to use me, you can use me. I'm the one, and each of you shared beautifully why you give from your perspective, But I want to give you one more perspective, real quick of why you give something that you can't fit in

a picture frame. If you either came to faith in Christ through this ministry or reconnected your faith in Christ through this ministry, at every location, I want you to stand for a moment. So I want you to see why you see that Omar, Stay standing, Stay standing. If somebody in your family or somebody that you love came to Christ or came back to Christ through this ministry,

joined them on your feet. That's why if you were ever going through a season of depression that was dark in your life and God used the ministry of this church to get you through that season like oxygen for your soul, stand up on your feet. And that's why it's not for some building. We build buildings. But that's why that's why I think that's everybody in the whole church standing. But if if you want to be the one that God is looking for, somebody shot I'm the one.

Shout back at these people who gave to this ministry, Say I'm the one you were given for. Say I'm the one. I'm the one. And now, in a beautiful turn of events, God allows you to be the one who gets to give to invest into His kingdom. I'm the one. Now. As a church family, we get to be a part of what God is doing right here through our expansion offering. The very first thing we would love for you to do is share the word that

God's put on your heart with us. We would love to be able to come alongside you and pray and believe with you for what God's laid on your heart. Head to myword dot Elevation Church dot com. Write your word on that side there and download a background that you can put on your phone or your computer to serve as a reminder to you to keep in front of you every single day what it is that you're believing, maybe personally for or as a family for the next thing is as we'd love for you to give and

participate in the offering itself. Head to Elevationchurch dot org and then on that page you can give at the top of the page and find the options available to be a part of this offering. Make sure you select your campus. If you do attend a physical location, select that campus, and for all of our efam our extended

family online, select online as your campus. You can write in the amount that you'd like to give to participate in this year and offering, and make sure you designate available year end expansion offering as the type of offering whether you're bringing your very first hive or you're giving an offering above and beyond. We can't wait to see what God does through you as we join together with locations and family all around the world to continue pushing

forward the message of Jesus. Thank you for being a part of Elevation Church, and we believe the best is ahead.